Bad news

"There are three twenty-four-hour financial networks. All their slogans are like, Ẁe know what's going on on Wall Street.' But then you turn it on during the crisis, and they're like, Ẁe don't know what's going on.' It'd be like turning on the Weather Channel in a hurricane and they're just doing this: [shuddering] Ẁhy am I wet?! What's happening to me? And it's so windy!'"--Jon Stewart. Bad News is the first book to probe the role of the business press before and during the financial crisis. When the markets unraveled and the U.S. economy began spiraling downward, reporters raced to cover an unfamiliar cast of characters and an alphabet soup of derivatives and toxic financial instruments. Ironically, the business of journalism itself began to cave in simultaneously, leaving the mainstream media faced with collapsing ad revenues and decreased circulation. As the business press began to receive criticism from across the political spectrum for the cheerleading coverage that helped create the financial bubble in the first place--epitomized by Jon Stewart's now-famous attack on James Cramer for his uncritical treatment of Bear Stearns and other financial giants--the media was confronte